


If You're Lost in the Dark

by Keikiakapueo



Category: Star Wars Sequel Trilogy
Genre: Dark Rey, F/M, Force Sensitive Finn, M/M, Multi, ReyFinnPoe is endgame, Reylo is temporary
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-01-05
Updated: 2020-03-16
Packaged: 2021-02-27 13:08:04
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 5
Words: 6,383
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/22137571
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Keikiakapueo/pseuds/Keikiakapueo
Summary: There's a voice in Finn's head and it tells him he's not good enough for them. There's a voice in Kylo Ren's head and it tells him they're not good enough for him. Finn's found a family, but is haunted by the one he left behind in the hands of a monster. He wants to save them, even if they don't know they need saving. (TFA compliant)
Relationships: Finn/Rey (Star Wars), Kylo Ren/Rey, Poe Dameron/Finn, Poe Dameron/Finn/Rey
Comments: 5
Kudos: 31





	1. Chapter 1

**CHAPTER ONE**

_It begins again in the cold, white snow. Rey lies prone among the trees. Above, the battle rages. Below, the planet crumbles. And ahead of him, robed in rage and darkness, is Ren._

_“Traitor!” Ren screams, and though he’s heard it a hundred times Finn’s bones still flood with fear._

Run _, his mind demands. And sometimes he gives in. Sometimes he abandons Rey and takes off into the forest. When he chooses that path, it’s a gamble to see if the ground will swallow him before Kylo Ren cuts him down. He never survives, and that’s good. If he survives, he has to live with the knowledge he betrayed the only person who matters. Her face is always his last thought before the darkness claims him._

_Then it begins again in the cold, white snow. Rey on the ground, the ships in the sky, the planet dies, and Ren arises from the shadows._

_“Traitor!” He screams. And Finn drowns in terror._

I’m sorry _, his mind pleads. And sometimes his mouth repeats it. When this happens, Kylo Ren takes pause. His lips curl into a sneer that feels like flames._

_“Kneel.” He commands. And FN-2187 obeys. He makes no move as the red saber lifts to his face and the flesh of his cheek burns. When the brand is complete, Kylo Ren commands him to rise and bring the girl. FN-2187 obeys, and must live with his betrayal._

_And then it begins again in the cold, white snow._

This time is different. He opens his eyes and the world is cold and white again, but the feral woods have been replaced with a sterile room and the roar of ships and cannons has been replaced by the steady beeps of med tech. The equipment is old and the room is small and stale. Not First Order. He did not kneel. The Resistance, then. Did he run? Did his fear overtake him as the planet fell apart? Did he abandon Rey to the demon of the First Order, the monster from his nightmares as a cadet aboard The Absolution?

Finn tries to rise, but his escape is arrested by the tubes and wires attached to his hydrosuit. There’s no time for this. He rips them out and leaves the room. Saline rivers follow in his wake.

People of all kinds hurry back and forth across the crowded hallways. It’s chaotic and desperate and no Star Destroyer has ever felt half so alive.

“Finn! Finn, buddy!” A hand. A voice. Finn blinks and remembers. Poe. His friend. One hell of a pilot. Poe keeps talking and Finn struggles to focus. Manages to catch “you must have a thousand questions.”

But Finn only has one.

“Where’s Rey?”

It’s General Organa who tells him what happened, and the General who sees his tears.

“You’re a hero, Finn.” She assures him.

“No.” Finn shakes his head, but can’t find the words to tell her how wrong she is. Heroes are brave and strong and sure and never, ever think of running away. Still, a hundred times he betrayed her but the only time that mattered he had made a stand.

“Yes.” She claps a hand on his shoulder, and smiles. There’s something familiar in it. Something cocky. “Some might even call you a Big Deal.”

He laughs. Hearing that name is both wound and salve.

“I need to find her.”

“We need you here.”

“How will she know where we are if we’re on a ship hyperjumping through space?” Finn asks.

“This.” Leia holds up a tracker, it’s blinking blue beacon promises to lead Rey home. “Now come to the bridge. We are in a solar system of thranta shit.”

“We could go to Yavin IV.” The General suggests. Some of the top brass laughs, though Finn doesn’t understand the joke. He feels out of place among these leaders and heroes of the Resistance. Poe is next to him, soaking in an irritated restlessness. All the pilot commanders are restless, an angry river of impatience that flows through one to the next, and it makes Finn jittery and anxious. They’re safe here. They have to be safe. Because how can the First Order find them in the middle of nowhere when there’s so much nowhere to search?

“We should split up.” Someone says. That someone is him. He’s on his feet before he realizes it and pacing. “If they find us-”

And then the proximity alarms begin.

“First Order!” A shout, and the panic begins.

“Permission to hop in an X-Wing and blow something up?” Poe asks the General, but he doesn’t wait for a reply. BB-8 follows him with frantic, nervous beeps and Finn thinks that, if they survive this attack, he’ll learn binary.

_I need to help them,_ Finn thinks, but before he can take so much as a step towards the hall there’s a hand on his shoulder. General Organa’s.

“Trust them.” She urges. Finn pulls away.

“There must be something I can do.” He won’t lose Poe again.

“Pray.” She says simply. “But unless you have a spare X-Wing and pilot skills I don’t know about you’re stuck here with the rest of us.”

The ship rocks. Alarms blare. A hit. Finn sees debris and bodies through the viewport. He pounds the quartz glass with his fist. As though he can break it. As though he can reach through it and grab the people floating away. Good people. Good people who wanted to help. Dead people who can’t be helped. He’s glad Rey isn’t here.

_“We’re not done yet.”_ The memory of Kylo Ren’s voice comes with the memory of the fear. Not the impersonal fear of dying in an attack but the intimate fear of being hunted down. The world seems to dim around him. He turns to General Organa.

“Kylo Ren-”

“I know,” she says. “I feel him, too.”

He opens his mouth to say more, but stops himself. General Organa stares out the window and wears an expression he’s never seen on a face before. He thinks this must be what Han Solo’s looked like when he cried out for Ben. Finn searches for a word and finds one. Haunted.

And just as he thinks it he’s blinded by an unbearable brightness. He thinks of Rey, he thinks of Poe, he thinks of Slip’s bloodied fingers reaching for his face. The bridge bursts open and the nothingness of space reaches in for him but can’t quite close its grip. Finn’s vision returns and he sees Leia with her eyes squeezed shut and her arms outstretched. Sweat freezes and floats away from her brow as she forbids the bridge and people on it from being pulled into an empty grave. Her eyes open, meet Finn’s, and plead for him to help. He wants to say he doesn’t know how, but there’s no air in his lungs for words. He reaches out to her, grabs her hand, and lets her take what she needs from him. Outside, corpses drift like fireflies in the night.


	2. Chapter 2

It is a strange thing to see his dream die so vividly. It is stranger still to realize it survived this long.

“You could have been great.” Kylo Ren whispers to his mother’s pyre. She was always more like her father than she cared to admit, the Supreme Leader once said, full of passion and anger and raw fervor. Kylo has never forgiven the man who had raised her on Alderaan, the weakling who caged the fury within Vader’s daughter and tempered her into a tool for the light. Kylo has never forgiven his mother for allowing it. It is – was - Vader's blood in her veins. It should have been Vader’s creed she heeded. She had been a princess, but she could have been so much more. Kylo had thought, in his heart of hearts, that perhaps the death of Han Solo could be her awakening. He wanted her to hate him. To hate the Supreme Leader. To let hatred consume her as it had her father. Once it had, Leia Organa could die and Leia Skywalker would rise in her place.

Kylo Ren watches Leia Organa’s casket burn in the cold nothingness of space and tells himself he feels nothing. Let her die with her precious Resistance. Their fear is their funeral dirge and it plays through the force like a symphony. He can’t feel hers and, though he knows it’s a weakness, is glad for it. Leia Organa had to die. But she didn’t have to suffer.

“Ren.” Hux’s voice on the comm, clipped but with the barest hint of softness that Kylo hates. Sometimes he thinks to kill the man for daring to know his secrets.

“It’s done.” Kylo snaps.

There is a moment of silence. The intake of breath.

Kylo turns off the communication channel. There’s nothing more to say.

\----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

The celebration is a sickness. A disease of gluttony and lust that reduces even the highest officers to beasts. They dance and drink and sing and even gamble and Kylo has the distinct impression of being in a Hutt palace. There’s a cry of triumph, and then a scuffle between younger officers over a deck of cards. He feels as though he’s covered in sweat and gristle.

“Animals.” Hux mutters in disgust. Kylo inclines his head in agreement. He does not like the other man. The other man does not like him. It’s the closest thing to friendship either of them has. They stand together at the head of the room with stiff backs and stiffer expressions.

“Where’s Phasma?” Kylo asks. The stormtroopers are having their own celebration, he knows, and he imagines it looks very similar to this. The thought makes him angry. Not at the stormtroopers- one cannot expect decorum from a hound- but at the officers who are proving themselves no better.

“There’s been an incident on Ansett Island,” Hux says.

Ansett Island. The site of the newest helium-3 mine. Kylo knows there had been unrest, but he’d never taken much interest in the mundanities of resource harvesting.

“What was the incident?”

“Company 77 has mutinied.”

Stormtroopers. Kylo bites his tongue to keep from lashing out. Blood seeps out and coats his teeth, it tastes of rust and ire. He thinks of FN-2187 and in his mind’s eye the traitor is laughing. Even in death, he mocks Kylo Ren. Takes the gift he was given, the gift of purpose, and throws it in his face. Kylo closes his eyes and forces himself to relive the satisfying moment his blade sliced through spine. More than just a physical blow, FN-2187 had come at him with anger and hate. An open door for Kylo to reach inside that treacherous mind. The doubt and fear all but screamed for Kylo’s touch. And Kylo, ever the gentleman, acquiesced. It was a simple thing, to ensure the trooper would relive this moment again and again as he died. Each time driving the point deeper and deeper that, at his core, FN-2187 was not a brave hero but a craven deserter. An apostate who had nothing. Who was nothing.

“Ren.” Hux hisses. Kylo looks up. The praetorian guard has entered the room and behind them is the Supreme Leader. The music dies down, the laughter quiets. The officers bend the knee in rolling waves. Some topple over and Kylo toys with the idea of making sure they never get up. He reaches out with the force, feels the heartbeat of the closest lush. A woman old enough to be his mother. His mother whose passion burned like a star. His mother who burned in the end. The stars had stood silent witness and silent judge.

He withdraws from her quickly and joins Hux on a knee. Resentment rises off Hux like smoke from embers. Kylo wonders what he’s done to stoke that fire.

“Rise, my apprentice, rise!” Snoke calls to him. Kylo obeys, and the moment he stands he realizes Hux’s hatred is not directed at himself but the Supreme Leader. A rabid cur, Snoke had called him. But useful. How useful would Hux be to Snoke now? Snoke gestures for Kylo to stand with him. The guards clear a space.

“It is finished.” Kylo tells his master, though he knows this to be only mostly true. The Resistance is gone, but there are rebels, hold-outs, stubborn fools who think they can resist First Order rule. His uncle is still out there, somewhere. And the girl with him. The girl whose anger burned pure and true. The girl whose darkness was black as space. He clenches his fist. He will not let Luke Skywalker ruin her as he ruined Leia. As he ruined Ben.

“Today is the end of disorder!” Snoke proclaims it to the crowd like victory, but Kylo knows the words are for Armitage Hux as rebuke. The man’s fingers rest on Kylo’s shoulders, squeeze. Tight enough to bruise. Tight enough to stress bone. He thought this moment would make him happier. The air tastes of ashes. “My apprentice has done what all others have failed to do. Killed the light of hope in the galaxy and brought the treacherous Resistance to its end!”

Cheers. Muted and reverent and eyes kept careful on the Supreme Leader’s face for the first sign of annoyance. The sound dies at a gesture from Snoke. Not even the lushes have lost that much inhibition.

“Our work is not at an end.” Snoke warns. “Do not grow complacent. We’ve killed the nest, but vermin still spread the disease. If we are to exterminate these curs, we must remain vigilant.”

Kylo meets Hux’s eyes. The man’s face is perfectly blank but his raw hatred is nevertheless on bright display to Kylo. It must be apparent to Snoke, as well, but the Supreme Leader ignores it.

“Come, my boy, we have much to discuss. The Future of the First Order is in your hands.” Snoke gestures, the guard turns and begins to march. Kylo feels like a bantha being herded to the slaughter. Nevertheless, he follows. There is nowhere else to go.


	3. Chapter 3

Less like corpses, more like ghosts. They haunt the darkness of Finn’s closed eyes. A thin layer of ice coats their bodies and makes them shine in the memory of starlight. When he had gazed out the escape craft’s viewport, shivering and exhausted, he had been unable to make out the silhouetted expressions. When he gazes out from the lens of memory, their faces are twisted in accusation. When he gazes out from the lens of memory, their faces are not resistance fighters but the stormtroopers he left behind. They’re perfectly still except for jaws that rise and fall like malfunctioning hangar doors. They have no voices but Finn can hear the constant click clacking of their teeth and knows their words. _Traitor. Traitor. Traitor._

“You’re not running anymore.” Maz Kanata greets him when she arrives on Delaya.

“I think I’m more of a scurrier,” Finn says. “One disaster to the next. Like a cannok.”

“Cannok’s scurry away from disasters.” Maz points out.

“Never said I was a smart one.” Finn smiles easily, but Maz does not believe it. He can tell it by the squint of her eyes and the noise she makes in place of a laugh.

“Maz, leave the man alone.” Leia’s voice is hoarse and stretched. She’s in the bed across from Finn, in the backroom of a med center in Little Aldera. “He’s been through a lot.”

“You’ve all been through a lot.” Maz sounds as though she’s chastising an unruly child instead of addressing the feared boogieman of every stormtrooper cadet’s nightmares. “Too much. And there’s more to do, but you are in no shape to do it.”

“I just need a little more rest,” Leia insists. “It’s going to take more than the vacuum of space to stop me.”

The vacuum of space had stopped most of her fighters. Her mechanics. Her engineers. Her people. Again. Finn wonders what it’s like, to endure when everyone else falls. To carry the heart and the memory of people who entrusted the future to you. She does not look so scary, swathed in blankets and wires. Finn knows she has ghosts, but her ghosts are not like his. Hers are the spirits of people who gladly gave all for her. His are the spirits of the ones he left behind. Maz and Leia bicker, but not loud enough to drown out the click-clacking of teeth. _Traitor. Traitor. Traitor._

“Where are you going?” Maz demands when Finn stands on shaky legs and rips off the monitoring equipment.

“First?” He wraps a blanket around his waist. “To find some pants. After that, I’m just tired of being in bed. Phasma would have shot me if I spent this much time in medbay back ho- on the _Finalizer_. Waste of resources.”

“Be careful.” Leia calls after his retreating back. He nods, but does not look back. The Resistance can’t afford to lose anyone to stupid decisions.

One pair of boots, tight pants and a jacket later and Finn is out on the streets of Little Aldera. The medtech who gave him the clothes had been a young man in awe, stammering out words into what might have been sentences about events that might have had to do with Starkiller. Finn had smiled and nodded his way through the conversation, trying to ignore the click clacking that came from behind his eyelids. The small purse of credits had been from an older medtech, a Bothan with a kind face who looked at Finn as though he was something tender. Finn has never actually held money before, though he knows the exchange rates across the major systems to each other and to galactic credits. He walks the cobbled streets and still marvels at the way no one glances at him twice. He feels the empty spot where Han’s blaster should be and curses himself for losing it. It had been nice, he thinks, to have something of the man. He wishes he had something of Slip beside nightmares.

He finds Poe inside The Dipping Thantra, a seedy bar saved from the title ‘cantina’ by the minimalist décor and the smell of lilies. The pilot sits next to Rose. Rose the mechanic. Rose the hero. They’re both heroes. It was Poe who tied a hose around his waist and launched himself out to grasp Finn’s freezing hand. It was Rose who fixed the escape ship’s damaged innards and launched them away from the pyre. It was Rose who spoke to Finn and kept him calm while Poe piloted them through the bleak black graveyard of Resistance fighters whose luck had run out. Teeth clacked. _Traitor. Traitor. Traitor._

“Finn!” It’s Rose who sees him first and to Finn’s surprise she wraps her arms around him. Before he can return the gesture, she hops away. “Sorry! Sorry, it’s just. I’m glad. To see you. Standing. And alive. I mean, obviously you’re alive if you’re standing because you need to be alive to stand. But not the other way, you don’t have to stand to be alive in fact there are species that don’t even have legs and I am rambling again. Hi. It’s good to see you.”

“Good to see you, too, Rose.” Finn claps her on the shoulder and tries to stand a little taller and a little more heroically.

“Finn.” Poe is quieter, more subdued, but his hug is loud and fierce and that’s all that matters. His breath smells slightly of ale. “Finn, hey, buddy, hey.”

“What’s our final count?” Finn asks.

“Fifty-three,” Poe says, then laughs. It is not a pleasant laugh. “I killed everyone but fifty-three people. And some of those were just on different missions. Black squadron was on a mission without me. A mission I sent them on. We might be down to…down to” Poe tries to count on his fingers but gives up. “Less than fifty-three.”

“This isn’t your fault.” Finn says. He thinks of the way he gunned down the hangar in the Tie Fighter. He wonders which of his friends fell to his blasts.

“It’s in the past.” Poe waves Finn’s words away. Finn wants to say more, but knows its too raw. Poe won’t hear him.

“My sister wouldn’t have gone if she didn’t believe in you,” Rose says.

“And where did that belief get her?” Poe snaps, and Rose slaps him across the face.

“I’m not going to listen to your pity party.” She snaps, “I don’t care how important you are.”

“Rose, wait, I-“ Poe slurs the words but Rose is already retreating. He sighs and takes another sip of his drink.

“You really have a way with the ladies.” Finn observes. Poe shrugs. They sit for a few minutes in silence.

“How’s Leia?” Poe asks.

“Angry she can’t, personally, punch a Star Destroyer in the face,” Finn says. “She’s going to be fine.”

“They tracked us through hyperspace.” Poe breathes. Finn wants to argue that that’s impossible, but the evidence points otherwise. “I don’t know how they did it, but they tracked us through hyperspace. They might be tracking us now.”

“No, no way.” Finn shakes his head for emphasis. “There’s no reason for them to wait. If they knew we were alive, we’d be dead by now. We have time to catch our breath.”

“I don’t even know where we begin rebuilding.” Poe runs a hand through his perfect, tousled hair. Finn pulls out the binary beacon in his pocket. The little, flashing light he feared would bring Rey to her death. Now it might bring the Resistance to their last shot at life.

“I think I have an idea.”

He speaks over the click clacking of teeth.


	4. Chapter 4

Once, Snoke had been as a god to Ben. There was nothing the man did not see. There was nothing the man did not know. Snoke had brought Ben to the bitter waters, and Ben drank from them willingly. Snoke had brought Ben to the altar, and Ben lay down on it willingly. Snoke had given Ben the dagger, and Ben had stabbed the blade through his own beating heart. Snoke had led Ben Solo to die, so that Kylo Ren could rise from his ashes.

Kylo Ren must remind himself of these things at times like this. Snoke has given a command. Once upon a time, neither Ben nor Kylo Ren would have hesitated to obey it. Snoke sees the power in him, as Luke once did, but he does not fear it. Snoke knows there is greatness within Kylo Ren, and the potential for more. So much more. All Kylo must do is listen and obey, a prophet following the decrees of his god.

Does a god know when he’s been betrayed? The thought makes Kylo Ren uneasy. He sits in his chamber and waits for news from his knights. He should be out there with them, leading them, executing his own orders. His talent lies in his fists, in his saber, in the darkness within his own heart. His talent does not lie in his patience. That is a game for old men and weak men. Which one was Snoke?

“No, no.” Kylo mutters it to himself and paces like a caged nexu. Snoke is strong and wise and has depths of power that Kylo can one day reach, if only he continues to follow the Supreme Leader’s teachings.

_He fears you._ A voice both his own and a stranger’s. It rises unbidden from the shadows of his mind and hangs in the air all around him.

“No!” He shouts it louder than his uncertainty and unleashes his saber blade against the walls, adding his fresh anger to the litany of rage already carved in to the once pristine white walls.

There has been an awakening. A whisper to a scream throughout what remains of the galaxy. Snoke feels it, Kylo Ren feels it too. Not just the stormtrooper, not just the girl whose rage Kylo Ren can still feel burn brighter and hotter than Starkiller, but hundreds. He and Snoke are in agreement that the adults must be killed, they are too dangerous, too untrustworthy, too set in their ways. But Kylo believes that the children are the future, Snoke believes in turning the future into ashes.

_He will punish you for disobeying_. The voice again. Kylo shakes his head violently as though he can shake the voice loose. Snoke will not punish him because Snoke will not find out his plans. Not until they’re well underway. Not until they’re giving the results that Kylo knows they will. Snoke fears the new Force users will be poisoned by the light, but Kylo will drown them in darkness. Once Snoke sees, he will understand.

Still, Kylo cannot kill the doubt within himself. Faithless. Timid. Weak. He is all these things and more. He ignites his lightsaber again and stares into its angry core.

“And the fire shall cleanse.” He whispers lovingly. Then runs his bare palm gently over the blade. The acrid stench of burning flesh is almost worse than the sensation and he’s held almost in a trance by the way his pale skin chars and leaves muscle and bone exposed. This is his penance. One he’s performed many times before. But this time the flesh has gone and left the blasphemous thoughts behind. He clenches his hand and screams from the pain. The room is shocked to disarray.

Relief does not come from the med droid that fixes his hand. Relief does not come from smashing that droid against the wall again and again until its carapace cracks open and wires and bolts fall from it like tears. Relief instead comes from the long strides throughout The Supremacy’s labyrinthine halls, turns and elevators taken heedlessly until he finds himself in the stormtrooper pits.

A training hall that reeks of sweat and blood and comradery that neither Kylo Ren nor Ben ever knew. Two troopers in full armor battle with electrified ryyk blades, but it’s the trooper on the bench who holds Kylo’s attention. His helmet is off as he waits his turn to spar, but it’s not important. Kylo does not recognize him from his dark brown skin or the scar on his right cheek, Kylo doesn’t think he’s ever actually seen the young man’s face before. Instead, he recognizes the force around him, the man’s aura that contains all of who he is and all of those whom he’s connected to. Three strands shine bright. Two are stale and raw, severed connections that float like raw nerves where family used to be. No, family is the wrong word. Stormtroopers have no family. Kylo doubts they can even comprehend, truly, what a family is. He envies them for it. Still, the man has lost two companions, and the last strand is bright and frayed but stronger than Kylo thinks it has any right to be. FN-2187 still lives in this man’s heart. Not in anger, not in hate, but in hope. And when FN-2000’s eyes fix upon Kylo Ren, it is not fear and adoration that first lights up his eyes but the barest flicker of hate.

A flicker is all that Kylo needs. He grasps onto it, that brief spark, and forces it to become an inferno. Hatred flows from Kylo Ren into FN-2000 and becomes the stormtrooper’s own, taking hold of him with such a sudden intensity the man cannot help but lunge at Kylo with a roar of raw loathing. His riot baton arcs down at Kylo and Kylo deflects it with his own saber before punching the man’s face. Kylo grins. It feels good to hit something that screams.

The scream has alerted the sparring troopers to the fight, and Kylo feels their fear overwhelm them. He shoves FN-2000 back with a flick of his hand before turning to the other two troopers. _Fear leads to anger,_ Snoke had told him, and its so easy for Kylo to make it so within their unresisting minds. _Anger leads to hate,_ and Kylo pushes them further, and they’re spurred to action. FN-2000 rushes him again, and Kylo trips the man like a cruel schoolchild. 2000 falls into one of the troopers, but the other is unimpeded as she runs directly into Kylo’s decapitating blow. Anguish fills the air, and Kylo revels in it for a moment. He allows the second duelist a glancing blow across his shoulders. Kylo makes three strikes, slow enough that the trooper can block them and Kylo can feel the rush of blade hitting blade, then he tires of the sport and runs his saber through the trooper’s gut. The trooper sinks to the floor with a soft, animalistic cry. They will die there, but not quickly.

“You!” Is all FN-2000 can manage to scream before he’s rushing at Kylo again. Wild, hateful swings of the baton rain down on the taller man and once or twice Kylo is surprised at how close the trooper gets to landing a hit.

“Me.” Kylo agrees. He wonders if FN-2000 even knows why, exactly, he hates his lord and master this much. Perhaps Kylo will let him die not knowing. Perhaps it is crueler to show him the truth.

But Kylo Ren has given everything he has to the dark side. Everything he is, is for the dark. So when he disarms FN-2000 and squeezes the man’s throat shut with the force, he shows him. FN-2000’s feet kick helplessly as he’s held in the air, and his eyes are wide and staring at a scene far away from The Supremacy and the two carcasses on the floor. The man screams, or tries to, as Kylo forces him to watch those final moments on Starkiller. When FN-2187 tried to stand against the dark side and was cut down like a dog.

“Do you know what happens when one akk dog is rabid?” Kylo Ren asks softly. He steps closer. FN-2000 does not answer. “You put down his whole pack.”

Then, in an act of pity unbefitting the grandson of the great Darth Vader, Kylo gives the man mercy and simply snaps his neck.


	5. Chapter 5

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hey guys! Sorry for the delay, life got hectic and now the virus and all that. I'm going to be posting more frequently now, I promise, but I'm no longer going to say every Sunday because I don't know if I can hold to that. Hope you enjoy!

These are the things Finn will remember about the moment before his heart breaks.

Leia stares at Luke, and Luke stares at Leia. Neither speaks. Both want to hear what the other has to say.

Chewbacca holds C-3PO and an R2 model Finn doesn’t recognize captive in an awkward embrace.

The Resistance, what’s left of it, file out of the ship and onto the green, green grass and laugh and cry and celebrate that at least this much is true: they are alive.

And Rey- Rey the scavenger, Rey the orphan, Rey his truest friend- is running towards him with her arms open wide. He catches her. She wraps her arms around him and squeezes so tight that he fears he might break. He lets her. She’s someone worth breaking for.

And then there is not pain but a vast, unending emptiness. Something warm and vital has been torn out of him. Zeroes is gone. Gone to where Nines and Slip are waiting. Gone to somewhere beyond his reach. Finn tries to breath, but can’t. His heart is a sky without stars.

“Finn?” Rey asks, but she doesn’t need to. Finn knows she can feel it too. Like a memory, like a dream, like an echo. A transmission he was never meant to send. _I’m sorry,_ he wants to say, but can’t. There’s too much to be sorry for. He’s sorry to share this pain with Rey. He’s sorry he didn’t come back for Zeroes. He’s sorry that he still doesn’t know why he’s here and he’s alive when there’s so many others that aren’t. He’s sorry he wasn’t strong enough to stop Kylo Ren from killing the only family Finn had ever known.

 _Did Kylo Ren kill Nines?_ A voice asks from the depths of his sorrow. _Did Kylo Ren do nothing while he watched Slip die?_

Finn doesn’t answer. He doesn’t have to.

“When Alderaan died, I thought the pain of it would end me.” Leia is at his side; her hand is on his back. “I thought it was cruel of the stars to continue to shine.”

Finn nods and thinks about the corpses he’s made. He thinks about clattering teeth and empty sockets where accusing eyes should be. It is cruel of the stars to continue to shine on him when he’s hidden so many from their light.

“I’m okay.” He lies. “I’m okay.”

He’s not okay, but neither is anyone else here. Every person that stands on this planet stands atop of a pile of caskets. Some they’ve filled themselves, others they carry with them. He straightens and nods.

“I think we all need to talk.” Scourge of the Empire Legendary Jedi Knight Luke Skywalker has his hand on Leia’s shoulder. Finn thinks he wants the reassurance that his sister is really, truly there. _If you miss her, why didn’t you go to her_ , he wants to ask. But doesn’t. Secrets are a rare commodity among stormtroopers, and to demand one so personal would be akin to mugging a beggar for his only credit. He stands still as Rey and Leia follow after the Jedi.

“Come on, kid.” Luke beckons, “we have a lot to talk about.”

Finn turns around, wondering who the master spoke to. A porg screams at him from the ground and for a moment Finn wonders what wisdom this porg has to share with the Force users. Then realization hits him, and Finn races to catch up.

These are the lessons Finn will take away from Luke Skywalker’s story.

Heroes can be afraid.

Heroes can make mistakes.

Families can love monsters.

Monsters will destroy everything that loves them.

“Every one of my students is dead because of me. Because I failed your son.” Luke does not look away from Leia as he says this. The words are laced with a darkness Finn did not sense from the man before. Something sullen and angry that’s as familiar to Finn as its foreign to Luke’s aura. It’s gone by the next breath, but Finn cannot shake the uneasy feeling that Kylo Ren was in this room. Rey places a hand on Luke’s shoulder, and Finn wonders what its like to be looked at so tenderly by a mentor. The closest thing he ever had was Phasma, and the only tender thing she gave him was tender muscles and tender skin after brutal hours of combat training.

“He killed all of them?” Leia asks. She knows the answer, but Finn knows she needs to hear it from someone she trusts. Someone she loves.

“He killed some. The lucky ones died in the temple’s destruction. The ones who survived it…” Luke looks away now, the weight of his words seems to weigh his head down. “Vicrul, Cardo, Ushar, Trudgen, Kuruk, and Ap'lek. He changed them. Found what darkness lurked within them and fertilized it. He’s in their minds like a parasite, they’re bound to his will and to the darkness.”

“No.” Leia says it without conviction. “He couldn’t. That’s not possible. One has to choose to walk the path of darkness, even if they’re led there.”

“Oh, I’m sorry, I forgot who the jedi master in the room was.” For the first time, Luke smiles. Leia returns it, weak though hers might be.

“Luke came here to save them.” Rey doesn’t so much offer the explanation as she throws it on the ground, impatient and defiant. “He sought the old wisdom for clues on how to break Ren’s hold on their souls. To free them, and the captives of his saber.”

“What the hell does that mean?” Leia asks.

“When I said the ones who died at the temple were the lucky ones, I meant it.” Luke stands up, the restlessness rolls off him like thunder clouds. “They died and passed into the Force. The other six, they suffer something worse. Something has been taken from them that made them complete. But the other three apprentices. The ones who tried to bring Ben and the others back to the light. Voe, Tai, Hennix. He killed them, but they didn’t pass into the Force. He absorbed their spirits into the kyber crystal of his lightsaber. Every one of that blade’s victims are trapped within that crystal. Powering it. Making it stronger. They’re screaming.”

“How do you know that?” Finn demanded. He feels the anger rising within him. That’s impossible. That’s preposterous. That’s too horrible to comprehend. Zeroes. Zeroes can’t be in that blade. Zeroes has to be where Nines and Slip are waiting. Zeroes has to have found peace, because Finn can no longer find his star inside his heart.

“He recorded it.” Luke laughs. It’s dusty and dry and devoid of humor and life and for a moment Finn feels the presence of Kylo Ren in the room again. “He recorded it and when it was done, he sent it to me to taunt me. That’s why I’m here, Leia. I can’t leave until I free them. I have a responsibility to them.”

“You have a responsibility to the galaxy!” Leia snaps and jumps to her feet. “We all have a responsibility to the galaxy. You think you’re the only one who wants to save someone? You think I don’t want to save my son? You think I don’t feel responsibility for what he’s become, too?”

“But I’m the one who can stop him!” Luke argues. “I am the last jedi. Who else, if not me?”

“Me.” Finn says, again surprising himself. He keeps the momentum, looks Luke in the eye. “I was a stormtrooper. Now I’m no one. But I’ll become a jedi. I’ll train, I’ll learn, I’ll protect the galaxy from the First Order.”

“Me.” Rey says. She stands next to Finn. “You know you can’t get rid of me, anyways.”

“Yeah, that’s for damn sure.” Luke mutters.\

“And me.” Leia walks next to Finn. “I’m ready to finish what I started.”

Luke stares at them, and they stare back.

“All right, fine.” Luke looks less annoyed than he sounds. “We begin tomorrow.”


End file.
